eBay, the e-commerce giant, is looking at cryptocurrency payments as a real possibility in the future.
According to the CEO of eBay Jamie Iannone, the company is also considering including non-fungible tokens (NFTs) on its online platform.
“We are always looking at the most relevant forms of payment and will continue to assess that going forward. We have no immediate plans, but it (cryptocurrency) is something we are keeping an eye on.”
eBay in a statement to Reuters
This is a way to also manage auctions that are being held on eBay trading digital currencies or selling digital collectibles through NFTs.
“We’re exploring opportunities on how we can enable it (NFTs) on eBay in an easy way.”
Jamie Iannone, eBay’s CEO
This comes a week after eBay discouraged investors with an unconvincing second-quarter profit forecast. Even though online commerce has gained a lot from the COVID-19 pandemic, eBay hasn’t benefited from it the way its rivals have.
Other companies have made this move already. Tesla announced in March that their cars were purchasable with bitcoin, but only in the United States.
“Tesla is using only internal [and] open-source software [and] operates Bitcoin nodes directly. Bitcoin paid to Tesla will be retained as Bitcoin, not converted to fiat currency.”
Elon Musk
Another firm that included crypto payments is PayPal, which is implementing services related to cryptocurrencies for quite some time now.
In October 2020, the company allowed its US customers to trade digital assets like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash on its platform.
Just a few weeks ago, PayPal introduced Crypto on Venmo. Thanks to this new service, users will be able to purchase, hold and sell digital currencies with $1 worth of crypto.
They will also have the opportunity to have access to videos, trends, and guides related to cryptocurrencies. This will significantly simplify their trading experience while also helping them answer some frequently asked questions.
